It’s the little things that catch you out. On the Shell-managed, Australia-flagged liquefied natural gas, LNG, tanker Northwest Stormpetrel the cargo engineer followed the rules as he checked the LNG forcing vaporiser’s steam trap to resolve drainage issues but thanks to a missing safety clip still got a painful face-full of steam that required him to be evacuated from the ship for treatment says a report from Australia’s Transport Safety Bureau, ATSB.Continue reading »

Ensure that the safe working load, SWL, of a capstan is greater than the rated pull of the capstan, says a safety alert from the International Marine Contractors Association, IMCA, following an incident aboard one of its members’ vessels. If the capstan does not stall before the wire fails the resulting parting of the wires can cause horrifying injuries.

Due to the company’s clear deck policy nobody was at risk but similar policies may not be in force, or practical, under other circumstances.

One of the newest artifacts in London’s oldest church
is a ship’s bell. The lessons of the British Trent
are still relevant today.

The Church By The Tower

Near London’s Tower Hill Memorial to merchant seafarers who died in World War 1 and World War 2 is the church of All Hallows By The Tower. Established in 675 it’s the city’s eldest church at thirteen hundred years old.

It was here that John Quincy Adams, sixth president of the United States, was married in 1797. William Penn, who founded the state of Pennsylvania, was baptised and educated here.Continue reading »

One might be forgiven for believing that controllable pitch propeller systems are the illegitimate children of HAL, from the science fiction movie 2001: A Space Odyssey, with a dangerously psychotic mindset all their own. Take the grounding of the Cyprus-flagged MV Merita at Steubenhöft in Cuxhaven.

When the esteemed Denis Bryant says: “This incident was the result of too many errors and failures and misadventures, including an unfortunately timed potty break, to easily summarize. I highly recommend reading the report in full” you can be sure that the report, in this case the US National Transportation Safety board’s report on the contact between the fishing boat American Dynasty and the Canadian warship HMCS Winnipeg, is worth reading.Continue reading »

At about midnight on the evening of 7/8 July 2014 the ro-ro ferry Stena Nautica with 155 passengers onboard suddenly decided it wanted to go hard starboard while departing from Grenaa Port, Denmark. Since she had not cleared the breakwater the result was a contact incident which put holes in her hull below the waterline and much denting. No-one was hurt but to go by the accident investigation by Denmark’s Maritime Accident Investigation Board, DMAIB, it appears to have been another design-assisted accident.

Lysblink Seaways, a DFDS-managed UK-flagged 7,500 DWT general cargo ship grounded in the West Highlands at about 0150 on 18 February while on passaqe from Belfast to Skogn. Norway. The nine-member crew is still aboard and a lifeboat from RNLI Tobermory is in attendance.

An offshore services company has been fined for serious safety failings following an incident in which a worker died after plunging 23 metres from a platform into the sea. The incident has been the subject of an MSF safety alert.Continue reading »

Crushing incidents have a particular sense of horror all of their own that needs no description. In the case of the fitter aboard the Bahamas-registered cruise ship Seven Seas Voyager he was left with serious injuries when a supposedly isolated ash dump valve closed on him, leading to hospitalisation for serious bruising and shock. He returned to the ship on light duties but two days later but continued to suffer from the effects of the incident and was discharged from the ship to recuperate at home for ten days.Continue reading »